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REPORT 


IN 


SCHOOL COMMITTEE 


ON THE 

HIGH-SCHOOL EDUCATION OF BOYS. 






BOSTON: 

ALFRED MUDGE & SON, CITY PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET. 

18 70. 


4--UB 

esi 


In School Committee, July 12, 1870. 
Voted, That the Committee on the subject of the High School 
Education of Boys in Boston have leave. to report in print. 
Attest : 

BARNARD CAPEN, 

Secretary, 



In School Committee, Sept. 8, 1868. 

Ordered , That a committee of nine be appointed, to con- 
sider the subject of establishing an Institution of Learning for 
graduates of the Grammar Schools, in which both English and 
Classical studies may be pursued. That said committee shall 
have public hearings, to which eminent educators shall be 
invited. That said committee, if they deem it expedient, shall 
prepare a full and liberal course of study, to be submitted to 
this Board, which shall include Latin and Greek, one or more 
modern languages, English Literature, Mathematics, Music and 
other sciences. That, if the need for such an institution is 
shown, said committee shall consider the expediency of merging 
in it the Latin School and the English High School, and of 
establishing in the new school a special course of study for 
those who desire to' fit for a university education. That in 
reference to such special class training for the university, said 
committee shall make inquiry as to the method of teaching the 
ancient languages in use upon the continent of Europe, as well 
as in the best English and American schools. 

The order was adopted. 

The Chair appointed, at the meeting in October, the following 
as the Committee, viz.: Messrs. Burroughs, Edward D. G. 
Palmer, S. K. Lothrop, Merrill, of Ward 14, Underwood, Wash- 
burn, Shackford, Mason, and Dillaway. 

Attest : 


BARNARD CAPEN, 

Secretary . 


In School Committee, February 9, 1869. 
Ordered , That the subject of a new Institution of Learning 
be taken from the table and referred to a committee of nine. 

The Chair appointed as the committee the same gentlemen as 
were appointed to constitute the committee in October last, viz. : 


4 


Messrs. Burroughs, E. D. G. Palmer, S. K. Lothrop, Merrill, of 
Ward 14, Underwood, Washburn, Shackford, Mason, and Dil- 
laway. 

A IfpQt • 

BARNARD CAPEN, 

Secretary , 

In School Committee, June 22. 1869. 

Ordered , That the committee on a new institution of learning 
be instructed to present to this Board in print, the remainder of 
the report of which they have given notice, on or before the 
thirty first day of July ; and that the report of this committee 
be made the special order for half-past eight o’clock, at the 
. September meeting of this Board. 

Ordered , that the committee carefully examine the High- 
School teaching of boys in Boston ; that they be instructed to 
compare it with that given in other cities, and especially with the 
plan of the higher schools in the leading cities of Prance, 
Switzerland, and Germany. 

Ordered , That this committee be hereafter known as the 
Committee on the High School Education of Boys in Boston. 

Attest : 

BARNARD CAPEN, 

Secretary, 

In School Committee, March 8, 1870. 

Ordered , That the subjects referred, in the year 1868, to a 
committee on a new Institution of Learning, and in the year 
1869, to the Committee on the High School Education of Boys, 
be referred to a special committee of seven. 

The Chair appointed as the committee, Messrs. Washburn, 
Underwood, S. K. Lothrop, Shackford, Mason, Reynolds, and 
Monroe. 

Attest : 

, BARNARD CAPEN, 

Secretary, 


REPORT. 


Rooms of the School Committee, August, 1870. 

The Committee on the High School Education of 
Boys, in fulfilment of the duties intrusted to them, 
hereby submit to the Board a new plan of work for 
the Public Latin School. The system of studies and 
the organization of the English High School, a sec- 
ond and not less important subject of inquiry, will 
be considered in a separate and subsequent report. 

That now offered proposes important changes in the 
plan of the Latin School; giving to the school a new 
and higher purpose; and embracing in the range and 
variety of its studies all that the best schools of our 
time anywhere offer. It is presented with the more 
confidence, that it has the assent of every member of 
the Committee, whatever differences of opinion may 
have existed among them at the outset. 

Every opportunity has been taken to consult pro- Need of 
fessional teachers in this neighborhood, and these the Latin 
gentlemen have given to the proposed alterations Sch00l ‘ 
their warm approval. The Committee are convinced 
that the educated mind of New England is ripe for 
such a change in schools of this class, and they 
believe that the example thus set in Boston will be 
promptly followed in every direction, and greatly 
advance among us the higher interests of education. 

The Public Latin School is an old school, endeared 
to many among us by cherished memories, and, from 


6 


its long and honorable history, an object of honest 
pride. It is a matter of deep regret that its pros- 
perity does not keep pace with the development of 
the city. Indeed, if the boys in this school were 
taken to represent the whole number in this com- 
munity destined to receive thorough mental culture, 
many a small town in New England would show 
a larger proportion of liberally educated men than 
the metropolis. The comparison becomes still more 
discouraging, if we bear in mind the very small num- 
ber of those attending the school who gain its 
professed object, — preparation for college study. 
The statistics of the school for the past fifteen years 
show that only one-fifth of those who enter it complete 
its course and proceed to college. For that large 
majority, therefore, whose opportunity for mental 
culture ends with this school, a training in which the 
whole course of study is kept subordinate to this aim 
of preparation for college, — many important subjects 
of thought being ignored or but little pursued, in 
order to meet the requirement of Cambridge in other 
branches, — is surely eminently unwise. 

Causes of Argument is not needed to show that the study of 
success, antiquity forms to-day as important a part of any 
plan of general culture as it ever has heretofore. 
That ordained succession in the development of our 
race, which we cannot alter, — the familiar fact that 
the thoughts, customs, and laws of our every-day life 
have been largely inherited from the earlier nations, 
and took their shape ages before our birth, — must 
forever stamp as imperfect any training which seeks 


7 


to set aside the great department of human knowl- 
edge in question. And, moreover, after full allow- 
ance is made for the scepticism now so prevalent as 
to the real importance of classical learning, as well 
as for that other tendency, which seeks to put all 
knowledge to the test of immediate utility, under- 
valuing any culture whose direct connection with 
success in life cannot he made evident, all the causes 
which prevent the full success of the school will not 
have been stated. 

If we except the introduction of a certain amount Narrowness 
of French into the Latin School, and some enlarge- course of 
ment of the course of Geometry, no change in the of 8tudy * 
list of studies has been made for nearly forty years. 

Within these forty years, nearly everything that 
makes the great schools of Europe preeminent, had 
its birth. If we contrast the amount of work accom- 
plished in these schools with that done in our own, 
the narrow range of studies among us and the mo- 
notony of our teaching are most strikingly shown. 

Our boys enter school at twelve years, and leave it 
at eighteen. The age of boys entering and leaving 
schools of Europe is the same. The hours of school- 
work are in many of those schools identical with 
our own; and are nowhere greatly in excess of our 
limits. 

The foreign boy, when eighteen or nineteen, has ^ o h y e . 8 n ch001 ’ 
completed an ample preliminary education, and Europe, 
comes well prepared to the studies of an industrial 
or a professional career; or, it may be, to the more 
advanced pursuit of science or letters. As to his 


8 


Latin and Greek, while he has not neglected a most 
careful study of language, he has, at the age named, 
been made familiar with the whole range of Greek 
and Poman literature ; has read Horace and Juvenal, 
Seneca and Tacitus, Lucretius and the Latin Com- 
edies, none the less than Virgil, Ovid, and Cicero; 
he has studied Demosthenes and Plato, Herodotus, 
Thucydides, and the Tragedians, as well as his 
Homer; he has carefully cultivated the literature of 
his mother tongue; he has learned, beside it, two 
other modern languages; in many of the schools, and 
notably in the French, the whole glorious teaching of 
history, ancient, mediaeval, modern, and contempora- 
neous, has been laid before him, and, skilfully inter- 
woven with it through all the years, the study of 
geography; he has had a most thorough and 
extended course of mathematics; in the depart- 
ment of the natural sciences and natural history, 
mechanics, physics, and elementary chemistry have 
been carefully taught, and also botany, zoology, and 
the leading facts of geology and astronomy; music, 
drawing and gymnastics have, in most schools, been 
kept up throughout the course. 

The school- The hoy who leaves our Latin School at eighteen 

Boston, years, finds awaiting him four other years of prelim- 
inary work before he can enter upon the special 
studies of his calling. In Latin, he has read, among 
the great authors, only Ovid, Virgil, and the orations 
of Cicero; in Greek, nothing but the Iliad. It would 
he a farce to say that he has had any real teaching in 
English literature, history, mechanics, or any portion 


9 


of natural history or natural science. Such great 
facts, even, as those of elementary astronomy, he 
knows by accident, if he knows them at all. In 
mathematics, his instruction has been notoriously 
weak. He has been taught no drawing or music ? 
and, if we except his military drill, no gymnastics. 

Two objections demand consideration. Desirable The rela ‘ 

J tion of the 

as it might be to secure for our boys an ampler edu- Sch001 to 

° . . Harvard 

cation, the changes proposed are, it is urged, out of college, 
question, since the Latin School is only a preparatory 
training school for Harvard College, has enough to 
do in meeting the requirements of Cambridge, and 
can accomplish nothing further. In reply to this 
view of the case, it is enough to say, that the Com- 
mittee are in many ways assured that nowhere will 
such an advance in school teaching be more welcome 
than at Cambridge; that earnest-hearted instructors 
there consider such a change in schools the first 
requisite toward a forward movement in the univer- 
sity itself, for the first time enabling it to undertake 
without embarrassment its own greater work. 

The second objection appears at first sight impos- Limit* of 

....... Time. 

ing enough. As things now are, it is said, boys are 
“^worked to death.” How is it possible to find time for 
all this additional farrago of learning which you pro- 
pose? The results of a different system of teaching 
seen in operation in other schools, the concurrent 
testimony, written and oral, of a great number of 
authorities who have been consulted, leave the Com- 
mittee no hesitation in replying, that the inability to 
accomplish a wider and more varied range of instruc- 
2 


10 


The plan 
stated. 


tion, is due, not to any intrinsic difficulty, but solely 
to the method hitherto pursued, and to the sacrifice 
of time which that method involves. And here 
it is proper to say, that the immoderate and 
unseasonable study of the rationale of Grammar, 
and especially of syntax, should, among the faults 
to be rooted out, hold the first place. 

The Committee, in now bringing forward their 
plan, wish emphatically to say, that the purpose of 
this effort is not in any sense to lower or lessen the 
classical teaching in the Latin School; but, on the 
contrary, to extend and develop that teaching, to 
make its range more varied, while we keep its work 
equally conscientious and thorough. It is idle to 
say that any man can attain a mastery of a language 
like the Latin without hard labor. The study can 
never become easy; it may perhaps be made more 
attractive. And that a scholar has not only the 
undoubted right to the fullest knowledge which his 
teacher can bring before him, but an equally un- 
questionable claim, that the instruction shall be 
made no more unattractive in form than the necessi- 
ties of the case compel it to be, can hardly be matter 
of question. It is further the judgment of the Com- 
mittee, in accordance with what they believe to be 
the general bent of opinion among scholars at this 
day, that more effort should be made than has hith- 
erto been common anong us, to convey to the boy’s 
mind some impression of the authors read, in their 
spirit and power; not permitting philological or 
antiquarian studies, however important, to shut out 


11 


of sight the charm of the writer’s style, or the weight 
of his thoughts. 

But while thus seeking to advance the study of 
the Greek and Latin classics, the Committee wish 
also to introduce an extended study of English 
literature; to add, if possible, thorough teaching of 
two modern languages ; to provide a suitable method 
of instruction in History and Geography. They have 
been extremely anxious to strengthen and improve 
the Mathematical course; to give some knowledge 
of the Natural Sciences, including Mechanics and 
Physics; to teach Music to a certain extent; Draw- 
ing, very thoroughly, as the great means of training 
the eye and the hand ; and Gymnastics, methodically, 
throughout the course. 

As has been already stated, this amount of work tm 8 plan 
is accomplished and habitually accomplished by the practlcable ' 
boys of many other cities within the years of study 
now established at the Latin School. A well-justified 
pride in our own boys forbids us to hold them 
inferior to any other in quickness or ability, and 
the city of Boston will surely see to it, that boys 
eager to study shall find at home opportunities and 
encouragement equal to any that can be obtained 
elsewhere. 

A single fact, which has been repeatedly urged 
upon the attention of the Committee as that most bard work, 
likely to provoke opposition to the new plan, requires 
to be plainly set forth. The goal placed before these 
boys is no easy one to reach. The prize offered is 
nothing less than the very best preliminary education 


12 


Hours of 

school* 

work. 


Latin and 
Greek. 


which modern times can furnish. To gain it, implies 
steady, hard toil. Beyond the hours allotted for 
necessary and healthful play, the boy’s time must be 
given up to his school-work. Frivolous and trifling 
occupations, amusements which take away the neces- 
sary hours of repose and the needed time for study, 
must he wholly set aside. Parents who cannot 
ensure this sacrifice, must be content to see their 
sons share the lot of those to whom Providence has 
denied that fair measure of bodily vigor, without 
which such mental labor should never be undertaken. 

The Committee recommend for the school the 
arrangement of studies and the apportionment of 
school-hours, which here follows: — 

The school-hours of the first -or oldest class shall 
be thirty in each week; those of the second, twenty- 
nine; those of the third, twenty-eight; and for each 
of the lower three classes twenty-seven; exclusive, 
in all classes above the fifth, of the time assigned to 
gymnastics and military drill. 

By the term “ hours ” used hereafter in assigning 
limits for each branch of study, the Committee intend 
the time given to that department, whether spent in 
preparing for the allotted exercise or in performing 
it. In naming the number of hours for each branch, 
no attempt has been made to assign the studies to 
the several days of the week: that work properly 
belonging to the Head Master and to the Committee 
of the school. 

To Latin ten hours are given in the sixth class; 
the same number in the fifth; six hours in the fourth; 


13 


and seven in each remaining year. Greek will begin 
in the third year, and will have seven hours in that 
year and in each year after. 

As to the method to be employed in teaching these 
two languages, the Committee cannot admit that ripe 
attainments in classical knowledge demand a con- 
tinuous drill in the rationale of Syntax, which, for the 
earliest years, is of all studies certainly the most 
irrational. A different plan has for years been pur- 
sued in Germany; and no classical scholars in the 
world surpass those of that country in thorough- 
ness, accuracy, and extent of classical acquirements. 
The Committee do not propose hereafter to neglect 
minute and thorough study of language, hut only to 
arrange differently the period at which this work 
shall be made most prominent, and to keep it always 
in due subordination to other, at least equally impor- 
tant, ends. Thus it is their desire that the boy who 
has acquired an elementary knowledge of the para- 
digms, and familiarity with a few essential facts only 
in Syntax, shall at once begin to read easy sentences 
in Latin, and to retranslate into Latin sentences which 
have been rendered into English: that for a consider- 
able period afterward, much time be devoted to 
translation through a wide range of authors, not 
neglecting accuracy, but deferring to a later point in 
his studies the minuter details of Syntax, or, if neces- 
sary, taking them up at intervals, in some passage 
expressly set aside for the exercise of parsing. 

In the higher classes, when the pupil has acquired 
a considerable vocabulary, it is believed that he may 


Method of 

teaching 

them. 


14 


List of 
Latin and 
Greek 
authors. 


profit much by spending a portion of his time in 
reading authors without translation, and in occa- 
sionally committing to memory important passages. 
It is thought a very great evil, that hoys who have 
read Latin for six years, should know no other 
writers than Ovid, Virgil, and parts of Cicero; and 
the Committee, while well aware that the manage- 
ment of details must be mainly left to the teacher 
and the authorized examiners, are prepared to exact 
that both in Latin and Greek an extended list of 
authors like that now submitted, shall form the basis 
of instruction, the more interesting passages of each 
writer being selected, and effort being made from year 
to year to cover as wide a range as the authorities 
of the school find with . all diligence possible. In 
the higher classes, moreover, it may often be found 
profitable, to excuse a boy from some of his regular 
duties, in order that he may devote himself to special 
work, classical or other, for which he has shown 
special adaptation. 

The list of authors is as follows : — 

Sixth Class. — Harkness’s Latin Grammar; Hark- 
ness’s Latin Leader ; Viri Roivle; Phcedrus, fables. 

Fifth Class. — Xepos; Elian, Extracts; Justin. 

Fourth Class. — C^sar, B. G.; Oyid, Metamor- 
phoses; Quintus Curtius; Virgil, _ZEneid I., II. — 
Cicero, De Amicitia, De Senectute. Greek Gram- 
mar, Rudiments ; Greek Lessons ; Xenophon, Anaba- 
sis begun; Lucian, Dialogues; Plutarch, one life. 

Third Class . — Latin Prosody; Virgil, ^Eneid 
III., IV., V., — Eclogues; Cicero, Archias, Mar- 


15 


cellus ; Sallust, Catiline ; Horace, a few odes ; Ter- 
ence, Andria, Adelphi. Homer, Iliad; Isocrates, 
Panegyric, Athens; Plutarch, Morals (one part); 
Lucian, Art of Writing History. 

Second Class. — Latin Verses, Virgil, CEneid, 

VI., VII., VIII., — Passages from the Georgies; 
Cicero, Verres, Catiline, Dream of Scipio; Horace, 
Odes, Epodes, Epistles; Tacitus, Agricola; Livy, 
one book; Quintilian. Greek Prosody: Homer, 
Iliad; Euripides, Alcestis; Demosthenes, Olyn- 
thiacs, Philippics ; Plato, Crito, Apologia. 

First Class. — Virgil, Parts of CEneid; Cicero, 
DeKepublica; Tacitus, Annals; Livy; Horace con- 
tinued and Ars Poetica; Plautus; Lucretius, Ex- 
tracts. Greek Verses; Homer, Odyssey; Thucydi- 
des, first book; Demosthenes, Philippics, Crown; 
Sophocles, CEdipus ; Aristophanes, Birds, Clouds. 

Throughout the six years, two hours of every English 
week are assigned to the study of English literature. 

In this brief time it is not to be expected that any 
complete course can be pursued. That belongs to a 
university education. The Committee have aimed, 
after giving a pleasing narrative poem as an intro- 
duction, to make an excursion through the whole 
field; and they wished, in so doing, to follow the 
chronological order, as best showing the develop- 
ment of the language, and making the scholar 
acquainted with our literature in its original springs : 
but this proved impracticable from the necessity of 
adapting the successive parts of the course to the 
learner’s varying age, capacity and taste. Of course 


16 


List of Eng- 
lish 

authors. 


there will not be time for more than a few specimens 
of each prominent author. It will be doing much, 
however, if the student is directed to the ample 
sources from which he can derive amusement for his 
leisure hours, and acquires a habit that will illumi- 
nate and ennoble his whole life. 

To carry out the plan of instruction successfully, 
it will be necessary that the school shall be provided 
with a proper number of copies of the larger works 
to be read. It is quite probable that a volume can 
be prepared to contain the shorter selections in their 
order. 

Your Committee are of opinion that one of the 
Masters should take sole charge of this department, 
that he may be able to give to the study a living 
interest, — an interest never reached in schools where 
the overtaxed master merely listens to an unappreci- 
ating repetition of words. They also advise that 
not more than fifteen or twenty pupils at a time 
should take part in the exercise. 

With this brief explanation, they submit a list of 
authors and selections, premising that very much of 
the detail must be left to the judgment and taste 
of the master. When a work is mentioned, it is 
intended that the whole shall be read, unless the 
contrary is stated. 

Sixth Class. — Scott, “The Lady of the Lake ”; 
Yisit of Jeanie Deans to the Queen, from “ The 
Heart of Mid-Lothian ” ; The storming of Front-de- 
Boeuf’s Castle, from “ Ivanhoe.” Goldsmith, “The 
Yicar of Wakefield”; “The Deserted Tillage”; 


17 


“The Hermit.” Campbell, “The Battle of the 
Baltic”; “Lochiel”; “The Soldier’s Dream.” 
"W ords worth, “We are Seven.” Cowper, “John 
Gilpin.” Tennyson, “The Charge of the Light 
Brigade.” Leigh Hunt, The story of Bhoecns, from 
“ The Indicator,” Ch. LII.; “My Books,” from the 
same, Ch. LXIII. ; “ The Graces and anxieties of Pig 
Driving,” from “ The Companion,” Ch. IX. 

Fifth Class. — Ancient English Ballads. Sterne, 
The Story of Lefevre, from “ Tristram Shandy ” ; 
“ The Starling.” Mrs. Thrale, “ The Three Warn- 
ings.” Beattie, “ The Minstrel.” Cowper, “ Pair- 
ing Time Anticipated.” Hawthorne, Selections 
from “ Twice-Told Tales ” ; “ The Gray Champion ” ; 
“David Swan”; “A Pill from the Town Pump”; 
“ Peter Goldthwaite’s Treasure.” Tennyson, “ The 
Miller’s Daughter.” Longeellow, “Evangeline”; 
Selections from “Voices of the Xight.” Morris, 
“ The Man born to be a King,” from “ The Earthly 
Paradise.” Hazlitt, “ On the Ignorance of the 
Learned,” parts of Ch. V. of “ Table Talk.” 

Fourth Class. — Gray, “Elegy written in a Coun- 
try Churchyard”; “The Progress of Poesy”; “On 
a favorite cat drowned in a tub of gold fishes ”; Ode, 
“ Ruin seize thee , etc.” Addison and others, From 
“ The Spectator,” Xos, 106, 112, 116, 157, 159, 223, 
499, 575, 631, 635. Moore, “ Lalla Pookh.” Burns, 
“ Epistle to Davie ”; “ Epistle to a Young Friend ”; 
“To a Mouse”; “To a Mountain Daisy”; “To 
Mary in Heaven”; “For a’ that.” Irving, Selec- 
tions from “ The Voyage ”; “ The Legend of Sleepy 

3 


18 


Hollow”; “Rip Van Winkle.” Bryant, “To the 
Evening Wind”; “To a Waterfowl”; “ Thana- 
topsis.” Hood, “The Bridge of Sighs”; “The 
Song of the Shirt ” ; “ I remember , I remember ”/ 
“Faithless Nelly Gray”; “Parental Ode to my 
Son”; “Morning Meditations.” Hawthorne, Se- 
lections from “ Mosses from an Old Manse,” Parts of 
a description of the Manse; “ A Virtuoso’s Collec- 
tion”; “ Rappaccini’s Daughter.” Shelley, “To 
a Sky Lark”; Introductory Portions of “Queen 
Mab.” Rogers, “Ginevra,” from “Italy.” 

Third Class. — Milton, “L’Allegro”; “ II Pen- 
seroso.” Pope, “ The Rape of the Lock”; “The 
Universal Prayer.” Irving, Selections from the 
“ History of New York,” Book III., Ch. 1, Book V., 
Ch. 8. Thomson, “A Hymn”; “ These, as they 
change ,” etc. Collins, “Ode to Evening”; “The 
Passions”; “ How sleep the brave” etc. Prescott, 
Selections from “Philip II.”; “The Battle of Le- 
panto”; “The Siege of Malta.” Coleridge, “ The 
Ancient Mariner”; “Mont Blanc”; “Genevieve.” 
Keats, “ Ode to a Grecian Urn”; “ To a Nightin- 
gale”; “ To Autumn.” Burke, “Letter to a Noble 
Lord.” Wordsworth, “ She was a phantom of de- 
light Parts of “ Ode on the Intimations of Immor- 
tality.” Holmes, Selections from “ The Autocrat of 
the Breakfast Table,” pp. 105-111, 111-119, 127- 
129, 189, et seq. Tyndall, On the Influences of the 
Sun, from “Heat as a Mode of Motion,” p. 446, 
et seq. 

Second Class. — Milton, “Lycidas”; Selections 


19 


from “ Comus.” Pope, Selections from the “ Essay 
on Man.” Dryoen, “ Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day”; 
“ Alexander’s Feast.” Spencer, Stanzas from first 
book of “ The Faerie Queene.” Thackeray, Selec- 
tions from the “ Four Georges,” and from “ The 
English Humorists ” ; Sketch of Irving and Macaulay 
in “The Roundabout Papers.” Lamb, From the 

Essays of Elia “ Blakesmoor in H Shire “A 

Dissertation on Roast Pig ” ; “ Imperfect Sym- 
pathies”; “Distant Correspondents.” Tennyson, 
“The Passing of Arthur”; “Ode on the Death 
of 'Wellington ”; Songs from ‘ 6 The Princess.” 
Lowell, “ The Vision of Sir Launfal”; “Harvard 
Commemoration Ode”; Selections from “Fireside 
Travels.” Whittier, “ Burns ” ; “ The Last 

Walk in Autumn ” ; “ Evening by the Lake 

Side”; Selections from “Snow Bound.” Ruskin, 
Selections from “Modern Painters,” Vol. I, pp. 
8 , 55 , 152 , 153 , 201 , 202 , 259 - 261 . Shakspeare, 
“ Julius Csesar ”; “ As You Like It.” 

First Class. — Macaulay, Part of the Essay on 
“Milton”; Selections from “The Roman Ballads.” 
Junius, “Letter to the King.” Emerson, “Kature,” 
from the “Miscellanies ”; “ The Snow Storm ”; “ The 
Humble Bee”; Selections from “May Day.” Mar- 
yell, “ Thoughts in a Garden.” George Herbert, 
“Sunday”; “Virtue”; “Man.” Byron, Selections 
from “ Childe Harold,” Stanzas to Athens, Canto 
II.; Battle of Waterloo, Canto III.; The Alps, the 
same; Apostrophe to the Ocean, Canto IV. Car- 
lyle, Essay on “Burns”; Essay on “Voltaire.” 


20 


Robert Hall, Parts of Sermon on the death of the 
Princess Charlotte. Changing, Parts of the Essay 
on “ Napoleon.” Bex Joxsox, “ To the Memory of 
Shakspeare” (No. XII. of Miscellanies). Bacox, 
Essays, Nos. XXII., XXXY., XLYI., L., LYI. 
Shakspeare, “ The Tempest”; “ Macbeth.” 

History and To the study of History, with Geography, two 

Geography, k ourg eyer y wee k are assigned throughout the 
course. No branch of study is so well fitted to sup- 
ply to a boy the defects of his own limited experi- 
ence, to enrich, strengthen, and ennoble his mind and 
character as History, in the hands of an able and 
enthusiastic teacher. In a school of this class, his- 
tory should be taught in no disjointed and fragmen- 
tary manner, but on a broad and generous plan. 
Simple in its lessons to the younger boys, concerning 
itself rather with the great outlines, and illustrating 
its truths with personal and biographical details, it 
should reach with the older scholars to a considera- 
tion of causes at work, and the connection and inter- 
dependence of events. Should an additional year of 
advanced study be hereafter established, History 
might profitably, be made to include, as in the French 
schools, the study of our own times. The course of 
Historical teaching prescribed for the schools of 
France, which receives from all who examine it un- 
conditional praise, appears to your Committee the best 
model for our imitation, provided only that the his- 
tory of France itself be made relatively less promi- 
nent. In connection with History, Geography ought 
to be thoroughly taught in more minute detail with 


21 


each year of advancement, and in such order as to 
illustrate the Historical studies. Your Committee 
consider the attempt often made to leave these two 
subjects to be incidentally taught by masters mainly 
interested in classical instruction, to be a grave 
mistake, inevitably resulting in the almost entire 
neglect of these departments. 

The following statement gives the outlines of the 
course prescribed for these studies and its distribution 
through the several years. The question whether 
text-books shall be used, and if so, what text-books, 
is left, with all remaining matters of detail, to be 
decided by others. The programme of the course of 
History in the Lycees of France is commended to the 
teacher as a suitable model. He is expected to cover 
in his instruction the whole range of such a plan. 

Sixth Class. — Ancient History of the East. Ge- 
ography of that part of modern Asia, corresponding 
to the Asia known to the ancients, between the Medi- 
terranean and the Indus. Geography of the other 
countries of Asia. 

Fifth Class. — History of Ancient Greece. Geog- 
raphy of Southern and Western Europe correspond- 
ing to the Europe known to the ancients. Geogra- 
phy of the other countries of Europe. Geography 
of Northern Africa, corresponding to the Africa 
known to the ancients. Geography of the other 
countries of Africa. 

Fourth Class. — History of Ancient Home. Ke- 
vision of Modern Geography of Asia, Europe, and 
Africa. Geography of America and Oceanica. 


22 


Modern 

Languages. 


Third Class . — History of the Middle Ages, from 
the fifth century to the fourteenth. Physical and 
Political Geography of Europe in detail thoroughly. 

Second Class. — History of the middle ages and of 
modern times, from the fourteenth century to the 
middle of the seventeenth. Physical and political 
geography of Asia, Africa, America, Oceanica, in 
minute detail. 

First Class. — Modern History from the date of 
the accession of Louis the Fourteenth of France. 
Review of previous geography. Geography in re- 
lation to climate, soil, production, manufactures, 
commerce. Cosmography. 

To the department of modern languages three 
hours are assigned in the second year, when the 
study of French begins. The same number of hours 
is continued in each year till the sixth, when four 
hours are allotted to this branch. In the third year 
one half of the time given to modern languages is 
devoted to the study of some branch of natural 
science, through the medium of a French translation, 
and one third of the time in the fourth year is to be 
similarly employed. In the fourth year and subse- 
quently, the scholar may pursue German if he so 
elect. 

Fifth Class. — Otto’s Grammar, first part, tran- 
scribing on the black-board part of each exer- 
cise. 

Fourth Class. — Le Grand Pere, or some selected { 
French author to be read, and the rules in the 
second part of Otto, to be applied in the course of 


23 

the reading lesson. The recitations from the French 
treatise on Natural Science to be made in English, 
with occasional practice in writing on the blackboard 
sentences from the original. 

Third Class . — In case the pupil undertakes in this 
year the study of German, he should begin with 
Krauss’s Grammar, the first or etymological part, 
with suitable exercises in translation. In French, 
he should read selections from the best standard 
comedies, and he made to commit and recite the 
most striking passages, and should also he exercised 
in writing on the black-board. The same course 
is to be pursued in reciting from the French 
treatise on Natural Science as during the previous 
year. 

Second Class . — In German, the exercises in Krauss 
to he continued with reading and translating from an 
appropriate reading book. In French, there should 
he original French composition; easy conversational 
French should be required during the exercises, and 
some French classic, as Racine, Corneille, Moliere, or 
Rousseau, is to be read. 

First Class . — In French, original compositions and 
exercises in conversation to be continued, with read- 
ing in French classics, or in some modern French 
historical or scientific work. In German, reading 
from the best modern prose writers and poets. 

In the Sixth and Fifth, and also in the Third and Mathe- 

matics. 

Second classes, four hours during each week are 
given to Mathematics: three hours being assigned to 
this branch in the Fourth Class ; and five hours 


24 


being allowed to it, with the addition of Book-keep- 
ing, in the First Class. The Committee consider it 
indispensable that this department should be for the 
present placed in charge of a special teacher, who 
shall be responsible for the mathematical teaching 
in all the classes, and receive from the master in each 
room such aid as he may request. 

Sixth Class. — [Sept, to Feb.] Review of Arith- 
metic, Eaton’s Arithmetic and Crittenden’s cal- 
culations. [Feb. to July.] Elementary Algebra 
through Simple Equations with one unknown quan- 
tity. Ray’s Elementary Algebra. 

Fifth Class. — [The entire year.] Elementary 
Algebra. Elimination pure and complete; Quad- 
ratics; Trinomial Equations; Calculus of Radicals; 
Inequalities; The Binomial Theorem; Ray. 

Fourth Class . — [The entire year.] Plane Ge- 
ometry. Chauvenet’s Elementary Geometry. 

Third Class. — [Sept, to Feb.] Pure Algebra 
begun. Simultaneous Quadratics, Generalization; 
The Problem of the Couriers ; The Problem 
of the Lights; Involution and Evolution; General 
Theory of Exponents; Loomis’s Algebra. [Feb. 
to July.] Algebraic Doctrine of Logarithms, 
including Fundamental properties and practice. 
Loomis, supplemented by Bremiker’s Logarithmic 
Tables. Plane Trigonometry begun. Chauvenet’s 
Trigonometry. 

Second Class. — [Sept, to Feb.] Plane Trigonom- 
etry finished. Chauvenet. Applications to heights 
and distances, mensuration, etc. [Feb. to July.] 
Solid Geometry; Chauvenet’s Elementary Geometry. 


25 


First Class. — [Sept, to Feb.] Spherical Trigo- 
nometry; Chauvenet’s Trigonometry; Review of 
Trigonometric Formula. [Feb. to July.] Higher 
Algebra; Loomis. Theory of Indeterminates of 
the Infinite and the Infinitesimal of Imaginary 
Quantities. [Feb. to July.] Discussion of the 
Quadratic Roots, Permutations and Combinations; 
Indeterminate Coefficients; Sines. Demonstration 
of the Binomial Theorem; Outline of the Theory 
of Equations, Exponential Functions, and the 
Logarithmic series ; Reviews in Arithmetic, includ- 
ing the metric system. 

To Natural History and the Natural Sciences, in Natural 

History and 

the sixth, fifth, and third classes, one hour in each the Natural 
week is given ; in the fourth class, one hour and a 
half; and in the second and first classes, two hours in 
each week. During the fourth and fifth years, in- 
struction is provided by means of a French treatise. 

In the introduction of Natural Science and Natural 
Philosophy into the course of study, the object has 
been to give such elementary instruction as is abso- 
lutely essential to every person of ordinary education. 

Much can be done to -awaken the dormant powers of 
observation, and impart the needed knowledge of 
facts, and of natural processes and laws, by a syste- 
matic course, pursued even an hour or two in each 
week, for six successive years. The course has been 
laid out with the fact in view, that a part of the 
pupils will obtain here all their knowledge of these 
studies, while a part will pursue them hereafter in 
their college curriculum. 

4 


26 


Other 

tranches 

Study. 


The course prescribes, for the Sixth Class, Zoology 
or Natural History, and the manifestations of animal 
life, chiefly by oral lessons of one half hour each, 
twice a week. 

For the Fifth Class, Geology two terms during the 
winter, and Botany two terms in spring and summer, 
in two lessons of one half hour each week, with 
Dana’s and Gray’s text-books, but relying chiefly on 
specimens and collections. 

For the Fourth Class, Geology and Botany, as in 
the previous year, with two lessons of three quarters 
of an hour each week. 

For the Third Class, Physical Philosophy and 
Mechanics, to be studied in a French text-book, one 
hour each week. 

For the Second Class, Physics and Mechanics, 
and Astronomy in French, two hours each week. 

For the First Class, Astronomy and Chemistry, 
two hours each week. 

In this course, limited as it necessarily is, much 
may be done to excite the curiosity, to convey the 
knowledge of universal laws and principles, to fur- 
nish the general nomenclature of the principal 
sciences, and lay the foundation for successful pros- 
ecution of any favprite study, whatever may be the 
business or vocation of active life. 

In the Sixth class, two hours are allowed for pen- 
of manship. Music and vocal culture have two hours 
in the Sixth class ; in the Fifth and Fourth classes 
one hour and a half: and are afterward an optional 
study. Drawing has, in the lower three classes, a 


27 


similar allotment of hours ; and has one hour in both 
the Third class and the Second. For Gymnastics 
and Military Drill one hour is assigned throughout 
the course: hut after the first two years this hour is 
in addition to the regular school-hours of the week. 

Music, Drawing and Gymnastics are to be taught 
under the supervision of appropriate Committees. 

It will be noticed that in the course, as now de- An added 
scribed, no provision is made for the study of Logic, 
or of intellectual and moral Philosophy; that there 
is no school period, in which authors are grouped 
together in reference rather to the truths taught by 
them than to their graces of style and expression. 

It will be question for future consideration, whether 
a single year, from eighteen to nineteen, ought not 
to be added for this class of studies, or whether it 
will be more wise to encourage boys who so wish, to 
pursue these subjects one year at a University, before 
beginning their professional or special training. 

The Committee offer for the consideration of the 
Board a new series of regulations for the Public 
Latin School; embodying in these rules provisions 
in regard to the number and grade of teachers, the 
terms of admission, frequent examination, and the 
system of promotion, which they deem of great im- 
portance to the welfare of the school. To avoid 
unnecessary repetition, these suggestions do not 
appear in the report itself. 


28 


Purpose of 
the School. 


Teachers. 


Require- 
ments for 
Admission 


CHAPTER XIII. 

Regulations of ilie Public Latin School . 

Section 1. The purpose of this school is to give 
thorough general culture to boys intending to pursue 
the higher branches of learning, or preparing for pro- 
fessional life. 

Sect. 2. This school shall be taught by a Head 
Master and as many Masters as shall allow one 
instructor for every thirty scholars. For the next 
six years two Masters beside those just mentioned, 
shall be appointed, of whom one shall have the whole 
charge of the mathematical course, and give if possi- 
ble the instruction in the Natural Sciences; while the 
other shall be teacher of History and Geography, 
and take charge of the course of English Literature. 
These instructors shall perform their duties in the 
respective rooms, in presence of the Master of each 
room, and shall receive from him any aid which they 
may request. A special teacher shall be appointed 
for each of the modern languages taught, and special 
instruction shall be provided in drawing, in music, 
and in gymnastics, under the supervision of the 
appropriate committees. 

Sect. 3. Each candidate for admission must be at 
least twelve years old ; he must be able to read Eng- 
lish correctly and fluently, to spell all words of com- 
mon occurrence, and to write well and readily from 
dictation; must understand Mental Arithmetic, the 


29 


simple rules of written Arithmetic, with reduction 
and fractions, both vulgar and decimal; must he able 
to explain the terms most used in Geography and to 
state the leading facts; and must have a sufficient 
knowledge of English Grammar to parse common 
prose. 

Sect. 4. Candidates for admission shall be exam- Time 0 fEx- 
ined only on the Friday and Saturday preceding the f^AdmL 
beginning of the Fall Term. 8ion * 

Sect. 5. The school shall be divided into six Classes and 
classes. The Master and the Chairman of the Latin 
School Committee may together establish any needed 
subdivisions. 

Sect. 6. The school hours shall be, for the lower Hours of 
three classes, twenty-seven in each week; for the® c 0 h r ° o1 ' 
third class, twenty-eight; for the second, twenty- 
nine; and thirty for the first class; excluding, in all 
classes above the fifth, the time devoted to gymnas- 
tics and the military drill. 

Sect. 7. The school course shall last six years. Examina- 
A daily record of each boy’s school-work shall be mode of 
kept. Once in every three months the Head-Master, Iroraotlon • 
together with the Master in each room, shall examine 
the boys in that room. This examination shall 
occupy not less than an entire school-day, and the 
result in the case of each boy shall be matter of 
record. At the close of every school year the results 
of each boy’s daily work shall be added to those of 
the four quarterly examinations. Those boys only 
who have attained a definite measure of success, to 
be from time to time determined by the joint vote of 


30 


Midway 

Examina- 

tion. 


Leaving 

Examina- 

tion. 


the Head Master and the Committee of the school, 
shall have a right to enter the next higher class ; but 
hoys who have remained an entire year without the 
desired promotion, may be advanced with their com- 
panions entitled to promotion, in the proportion of 
one of the former to three of the latter; unless the 
negligence of any such pupil has been gross and 
extreme; and in this class of cases promotion is 
forbidden. 

Sect. 8 . Candidates for advancement from the 
fourth class to the third, shall pass an examination 
before the Head Master of the school, a Master 
designated by the Head Master, and a person invited 
by the Committee of the school, for whose service 
due remuneration shall be provided by the Board; 
which examination shall be both written and oral, 
and shall continue not less than three school days. 
Boys failing at this examination in two successive 
years shall not remain members of the school. 

Sect. 9. At the close of the last school year an 
examination shall take place before the Head Master 
and six other persons invited for the purpose by the 
committee of the school, for whose services the board 
shall provide due remuneration, to try the readiness 
of each boy for university studies. This examina- 
tion shall be with great care arranged to test the 
real acquirements of the scholar; no special adap- 
tation of his studies in the weeks preceding shall be 
permitted; all possible sources of discomfiture and 
embarrassment shall be watched and removed ; and 
the examiners are required to pronounce each candi- 


31 


date either Prepared or Not Prepared, no other 
terms being allowed. To those Prepared a suitable 
diploma shall be given. 

Sect. 10. The studies pursued in the several 
years of the course, and the list of authors used, are 
here given. 

Sixth Class . — Harkness’s Latin Grammar (Budi- 
ments) ; Harkness’s Latin Leader; Yiri Bonne; 
Fables of Phoedrus; Scott, Goldsmith, Campbell, 
■Wordsworth, Cowper, Tennyson, Leigh Hunt; An- 
cient History of the East; Eeview of General Geog- 
raphy; Geography of Asia; Arithmetic reviewed and 
completed, Eaton’s Arithmetic, Crittenden’s Calcula- 
tions; Elementary Algebra through Simple Equa- 
tions, one unknown quantity; Bay’s Elementary 
Algebra; Zoology; Drawing; Penmanship; Music; 
Gymnastics. 

Fifth Class . — Nepos; Elian, Extracts; Justin; 
Old English Ballads; Sterne, Mrs. Thrale, Beattie, 
Cowper, Hawthorne, Tennyson, Longfellow, Morris; 
Hazlitt; History of Ancient Greece; Geography of 
Europe and Africa; Otto’s French Grammar, first 
part with exercises; Elementary Algebra, to the 
Binomial Theorem, Bay; Geology (winter); Botany 
(spring and summer), Dana and Gray, with speci- 
mens; Drawing; Music; Gymnastics. 

Fourth Class . — Caesar, De Bello Gallico; Ovid, 
Metamorphoses; Quintus Curtius; Yirgil, -ZEneid 
I.II. — Cicero, De Amicitia; De Senectute; Greek 
, Grammar (Budiments) ; Greek Lessons; Xeno- 
phon, Anabasis begun; Lucian, Dialogues; Plutarch, 


32 


one life; Gray, Addison, Moore, Burns, Irving, 
Bryant, Hood, Hawthorne, Shelley, Rogers; His- 
tory of Ancient Rome; Revision of Geography of 
Asia, Europe and Africa; Geography of America 
and Oceanica; Le Grand Pere, with applications of 
Syntax; Exercises in translating and writing from a 
French treatise on Natural Science; Plane Geometry; 
Chauvenet’s Elementary Geometry; Geology and 
Botany, as in previous year; Drawing; Music; 
Gymnastics. 

Third Class. — Latin Prosody; Virgil, AEneid 
III., IV., V., — Eclogues; Cicero, Archias, Mar- 
cellus; Sallust, Catiline; Horace, a few odes; Ter- 
ence, Andria, Adelphi. Homer, Iliad; Isocrates, 
Panegyric, Athens ; Plutarch, Morals (one part) 
Lucian, Art of Writing History; Milton, Pope, 
Irving, Thomson, Collins, Prescott, Coleridge, Keats, 
Burke, Wordsworth, Holmes, Tyndall. History of 
the Middle Ages, from the fifth century to the four- 
teenth; Physical and Political Geography of Europe 
in minute detail; French Comedy; Translation; 
Recitation; Writing French; Exercises in trans- 
lating and writing from French Scientific Treatise; 
Krauss’s German Grammar, with Exercises in Ger- 
man; Pure Algebra begun; Algebraic Doctrine of 
Logarithms; Loomis’s Algebra; Bremiker’s Loga- 
rithmic Tables; Plane Trigonometry begun; Chau- 
venet’s Trigonometry; a French Treatise on Physical 
Philosophy and Mechanics; Drawing; Music (op- 
tional) ; Gymnastics. 

Second Class. — Latin Verses; Virgil, ^Eneid VI., 


33 


VII., VIII., — Passages fron the Georgies; Cicero; 
Verres, Catiline, Dream of Scipio; Horace, Odes, 
Epodes, Epistles; Tacitus, Agricola; Livy, one book; 
Quintilian; Greek Prosody; Homer, Iliad; Euri- 
pides, Alcestis ; Demosthenes, Olynthiacs, Philippics; 
Plato, Crito, Apologia; Milton, Pope, Dry den, Spen- 
cer, Thackeray, Lamb, Tennyson, Lowell, Whittier, 
Ruskin, Shakspeare ; History of the Middle Ages, 
and of Modern Times, from the fourteenth century 
to the middle of the seventeenth. Physical and polit- 
ical geography of Asia, Africa, America, Oceanica, 
in minute detail; Racine, Corneille, Moliere, Rous- 
seau; French Essay; Conversation in French; 
Krauss’s Grammar, with German Reader; Plane Tri- 
gonometry finished, with applications; Chauvenet, 
Solid Geometry; Chauvenet’s Elementary Geometry; 
Physics ; Mechanics ; Astronomy (French Treatise) ; 
Drawing; Music (optional); Gymnastics. 

First Class. — Virgil, Parts of ^Eneid; Cicero, 
De Republica; Tacitus, Annals; Livy; Horace con- 
tinued, with Ars Poetica; Plautus; Lucretius, Ex- 
tracts; Greek Verses; Homer, Odyssey; Thucydides, 
first book; Demosthenes, Philippics, De Corona; 
Sophocles, (Edipus, Aristophanes, Birds, Clouds; 
Macaulay, Junius, Emerson, Marvell, George Her- 
bert, Byron, Carlyle, Robert Hall, Channing, Ben 
Jonson, Bacon, Shakspeare; Modern History, from 
the accession of Louis the Fourteenth of France; 
Geography reviewed; Geography in relation to cli- 
mate, soil, manufactures, commerce; Cosmography; 
French, as in previous year, a French Historical, or 


5 


34 


Scientific author; German prose writers and poetry; 
Spherical Trigonometry ; Chauvenet’s Trigonometry ; 
Review of Trigonometric Formulae, Higher Algebra, 
etc.; Loomis’s Algebra; Chemistry; Astronomy; 
Music (optional) ; Gymnastics. 

HENRY S. WASHBURN, 
SAMUEL K. LOTHROP, 

LYMAN MASON, 

FRANCIS H. UNDERWOOD, 
CHARLES C. SHACKFORD, 
JOHN P. REYNOLDS, 

GEORGE H. MONROE, 

Committee . 


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